Silent Hill – Review

Quite liking the video game series, I was happy that the creepy ass stories were getting a film adaptation when this was released. While a lot of people don’t think much of any in the film series, I dig plenty about this movie, even if it does slow down a bit at times. It holds some good actors and is an okay stab at the general game lore.

As Rose de Silva (Mitchell) finds her daughter Sharon (Ferland) missing from her house, she bolts outside to find the sleepwalking girl, while her husband Christopher (Bean) tries to catch up. Crossing under a busy street, Rose finds Sharon standing on a cliff next to a waterfall. Sharon has a vision of some sort of a descending darkness below her, and a demonic little girl staring back. As Rose catches her from an attempt to jump off, Sharon screams out the name Silent Hill while writhing on the ground.

Rose takes Sharon on a special trip, determined to help her daughter with her ongoing traumas and bad dreams. Christopher is left behind and is frustrated with Rose’s choice, as he wants his daughter medicated. He finds his wife has been researching ghost towns, namely Silent Hill, West Virginia. This town has a tainted past with catastrophic fires that killed townsfolk.

After gassing up her Jeep Liberty and meeting motorcycle cop Cybill Bennett (Holden), Rose finds herself at her desired destination of Silent Hill. However, this is where her waking nightmare begins… Will Rose be able to help Sharon with her visions of doom, or will she succumb to the insanity surrounding her in the haunted town?

Silent Hill is definitely too long and has some iffy pacing, but it also brings some decent ideas and gnarly monster design. It is an ominous and mysterious trek through many levels of hell and terror, with a good cast, sound, music and artistic design. The actors do what they can with their characters, but some are admittedly pretty thinly written.

For patient viewers there will be bloody payoffs and cryptic answers by the end. Visually I thought this film did a lot right in bringing the video game series to life, and some of the music and sound effects are spot on. Script wise… well, it is lacking but it was good enough for me to have a good time despite stiff dialogue. I think it was missing some emotional connection as well as a haunting and fully soul crushing story, but for a two-hour film it wasn’t too bad.

As stated before, critics seem to hate this series, including not thinking much of this one, but it’s solid enough to me. It is not a pure adaptation of any of the games, but has elements of a couple of them. I like a bunch of the scenes, and the last 20 minutes or so are pretty good.

“Look at me. I’m burning.”